Peabo Bryson, Voice of Disney Ballads, Dies at 75
The two-time Grammy winner whose duets defined Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin has died at 75, days after a stroke.
- Peabo Bryson died on Tuesday, June 2, at the age of 75, surrounded by his family.
- He passed away days after a stroke, at 5 p.m. Eastern time.
- He sang the title theme of Beauty and the Beast with Celine Dion and A Whole New World for Aladdin with Regina Belle.
- A two-time Grammy winner, he began his career in the mid-1970s.
Peabo Bryson, the American singer whose ballads defined two of Disney’s grandest love stories, died on Tuesday, June 2, at the age of 75. He passed away surrounded by his family, days after suffering a stroke.
According to a statement from his family, his death came peacefully in the late afternoon. A voice that generations recognised as the very sound of the romantic ballad has fallen silent, and with it a sound that filled cinemas in the early 1990s.
He passed peacefully at 5 p.m. on Tuesday, June 2, surrounded by the love of his family and loved ones.
How did his voice become the sound of Disney?
For audiences around the world, Bryson’s name is most firmly tied to two films. With Celine Dion, he sang the title theme of the 1991 animated hit Beauty and the Beast, a duet that became one of the best-known cinematic love songs of its era.
Just a year later, he recorded A Whole New World for Aladdin with Regina Belle. That song entered history as the first track from an animated film to climb to the very top of the Billboard Hot 100.
- Beauty and the Beast, a duet with Celine Dion, 1991
- A Whole New World for Aladdin, a duet with Regina Belle
- The first song from an animated film to top the Billboard Hot 100
A career spanning half a century
Bryson launched his music career back in the mid-1970s and, across the decades, built a reputation as one of the most recognisable voices on the American soul and pop scene. Over that long run he won two Grammy Awards, honours that confirmed his standing among the finest vocalists of his generation.
Health troubles had shadowed him before. As far back as 2019, he survived a heart attack, recovered, and kept working. This time, after the stroke, there was no recovery.
He leaves behind a catalogue that still plays at weddings, on radio stations, and in cinema re-releases of the Disney classics. His duets remain part of the shared memory of the generations who grew up with those films.
Which Bryson ballad came to mind first when you heard the news?
